Sustainability

Our sustainability offering

Committed and responsible

Nedbank’s commitment to green-conscious growth is reflected in the Nedbank Sustainable Business Awards. This event promotes and recognises the contributions that businesses make to sustainable development in South Africa and the rest of Africa in the resource, infrastructure, diversified industrial and retail industries.

Green funding

We are committed to growing the green economy, and all deals are structured around creating innovative solutions for sustainable growth.

We also lead the way in green funding projects. In 2011, we launched South Africa’s first green index – a benchmark for green-conscious investors.

In the area of carbon finance, we have dedicated teams that help our clients measure, reduce and offset greenhouse gas emissions through carbon strategies, carbon footprinting and initiatives focused on energy effeciency, forestry and particularly renewable energy, covering landfill gas, solar, hydro- and wind projects.

Responsible lending

In 2005 Nedbank Group became the first African bank to adopt the Equator Principles – a set of performance standards and guidelines governed by the International Finance Corporation. These guidelines apply to all project finance transactions exceeding US$10 million.

These principles affect the way project finance takes place in emerging markets. We conduct assessments of the environmental impacts of those we do business with to ensure that the projects we finance are not damaging to the environment.

Our responsible approach to lending extends beyond the mere rejection of transactions that do not meet the required- sustainability standards, but includes the provision of advice and guidance to potential clients to enable compliance with these requirements.

Sustainability initiatives

In June 2010 Nedbank was part of an innovative power-saving initiative that saw solar-powered traffic lights installed at a number of intersections around Sandton in Johannesburg. The lights are powered exclusively by solar energy, thereby lessening the load and reducing dependency on the region‘s power grid.